Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Mein Nationalfeierstag in Deutschland
Today was Independence Day, but one would hardly even know it here in Munich, despite the city's popularity with both American tourists and visiting scholars. Some of the students in my German class didn't even realize the date until the teacher commented on its brief mention in one of the local newspapers. Frankly, I was surprised it got even that much notice. After all, it's not like the American media devotes much time to Germany's national holiday. (Be honest, you don't even know when it is, do you?) And I'm not writing this to impugn Germans in particular for their lack of sensitivity. The Fourth of July just doesn't merit the same attention outside of the States. And yet somehow, life goes on.
As soon as the subject was broached in class, a few of us started considering ways to celebrate the day. The location of good American restaurants and the legality (or lack thereof) of purchasing fireworks in Germany were both considered, and a few held out hope that perhaps the American consulate might be aware of a larger celebration in the works. I, however, was relatively certain such would not be the case due to an experience I had a few years ago when I was traveling with my family in Britain. We were there on Independence Day and thought that given the unique role that the English played in American history there might be some sort of event planned. A stop by the embassy in London, however, revealed that the American government did not consider it in its diplomatic self-interest to revel in patriotic fervor on the Fourth of July, particularly since such enthusiasm was directly linked to the humiliation of the country.
Still, this was not England. This was German and everyone knows that Germany and America are old friends. As Tom Lehrer noted, we taught them a lesson in 1918, and they've hardly bothered us since then. But tentative plans to eat dinner at Munich's greatest bastion of American culture, the Hard Rock Cafe, fell through, and instead I ended up celebrating America's birthday by taking pride in that nation's greatest contribution to world culture: the mindless summer blockbuster.
The nearest movie theater to the Schiller Center was located a few steps away from Sendlinger Tor.
As I learned during our tour of the Old City earlier in the day, this ivy-encrusted structure was originally one of the gates in Munich's old town walls as well as the site of one the city's first subway (U-Bahn) stations. [Strange fact: Apparently before the subway opened, people used to go into the tunnels to pick edible mushrooms!] The cinema nearby seemed to specialize in showing American movies, which made it perfect for the holiday I was trying to celebrate. After a small debate, my American friend and I decided to see Ocean's 13. Never mind the fact that it would be dubbed and that I hadn't seen either of the earlier movies in the franchise from beginning to end.
I had been told by those in the know that going to the movies in Germany would be a notably different experience from the United States, but most of the differences in the actual movie-going experience were relatively superficial. Granted, we had a choice as to how much we paid for tickets depending on where we wanted to sit (yes, there were assigned seats), but the movie still didn't start on time thanks to an over-proliferation of pre-show advertisements. Honestly, do Germans love Axe Body Spray so much that people will regularly sit through 4 different variations of the same advertisement for that product before their films? And then there were trailers, as one might expect, for both American and European films before a brief pause to change reels and actually start the film.
I had been told that the Ocean's X franchise suffered from overly complex plots that were difficult enough to follow in English, but I think I could follow this movie relatively well despite the German dubbing. Granted, I have no idea of the various characters who were disguising themselves changed their accents and it took some time to get used to seeing the mouths of well-known American actors emitting German dialogue. Possibly the only one who sounded natural in the part was Al Pacino, but as the villain, I figure the use of German only helped add a touch of menace to his normally intimidating self. All in all, this was not the greatest film ever made (Can anyone explain how exactly the rigged dice in the finale worked?) but with its slick caper plot, all-star cast, and loving reverence for Las Vegas the way Frankie and the boys would have liked it, it was a welcome touch of American mindlessness that saved my Fourth of July. I would have said it was a popcorn movie, though as far as I can tell, popcorn is not popular here in Germany...at least, I haven't seen it for sale at any stores. Nevertheless, when followed up with a pizza and a beer, it almost felt like I was back home.
Except of course that the pizza place was within about two blocks of classy examples of European architecture like this one:
But more on that later.
Today was Independence Day, but one would hardly even know it here in Munich, despite the city's popularity with both American tourists and visiting scholars. Some of the students in my German class didn't even realize the date until the teacher commented on its brief mention in one of the local newspapers. Frankly, I was surprised it got even that much notice. After all, it's not like the American media devotes much time to Germany's national holiday. (Be honest, you don't even know when it is, do you?) And I'm not writing this to impugn Germans in particular for their lack of sensitivity. The Fourth of July just doesn't merit the same attention outside of the States. And yet somehow, life goes on.
As soon as the subject was broached in class, a few of us started considering ways to celebrate the day. The location of good American restaurants and the legality (or lack thereof) of purchasing fireworks in Germany were both considered, and a few held out hope that perhaps the American consulate might be aware of a larger celebration in the works. I, however, was relatively certain such would not be the case due to an experience I had a few years ago when I was traveling with my family in Britain. We were there on Independence Day and thought that given the unique role that the English played in American history there might be some sort of event planned. A stop by the embassy in London, however, revealed that the American government did not consider it in its diplomatic self-interest to revel in patriotic fervor on the Fourth of July, particularly since such enthusiasm was directly linked to the humiliation of the country.
Still, this was not England. This was German and everyone knows that Germany and America are old friends. As Tom Lehrer noted, we taught them a lesson in 1918, and they've hardly bothered us since then. But tentative plans to eat dinner at Munich's greatest bastion of American culture, the Hard Rock Cafe, fell through, and instead I ended up celebrating America's birthday by taking pride in that nation's greatest contribution to world culture: the mindless summer blockbuster.
The nearest movie theater to the Schiller Center was located a few steps away from Sendlinger Tor.
As I learned during our tour of the Old City earlier in the day, this ivy-encrusted structure was originally one of the gates in Munich's old town walls as well as the site of one the city's first subway (U-Bahn) stations. [Strange fact: Apparently before the subway opened, people used to go into the tunnels to pick edible mushrooms!] The cinema nearby seemed to specialize in showing American movies, which made it perfect for the holiday I was trying to celebrate. After a small debate, my American friend and I decided to see Ocean's 13. Never mind the fact that it would be dubbed and that I hadn't seen either of the earlier movies in the franchise from beginning to end.
I had been told by those in the know that going to the movies in Germany would be a notably different experience from the United States, but most of the differences in the actual movie-going experience were relatively superficial. Granted, we had a choice as to how much we paid for tickets depending on where we wanted to sit (yes, there were assigned seats), but the movie still didn't start on time thanks to an over-proliferation of pre-show advertisements. Honestly, do Germans love Axe Body Spray so much that people will regularly sit through 4 different variations of the same advertisement for that product before their films? And then there were trailers, as one might expect, for both American and European films before a brief pause to change reels and actually start the film.
I had been told that the Ocean's X franchise suffered from overly complex plots that were difficult enough to follow in English, but I think I could follow this movie relatively well despite the German dubbing. Granted, I have no idea of the various characters who were disguising themselves changed their accents and it took some time to get used to seeing the mouths of well-known American actors emitting German dialogue. Possibly the only one who sounded natural in the part was Al Pacino, but as the villain, I figure the use of German only helped add a touch of menace to his normally intimidating self. All in all, this was not the greatest film ever made (Can anyone explain how exactly the rigged dice in the finale worked?) but with its slick caper plot, all-star cast, and loving reverence for Las Vegas the way Frankie and the boys would have liked it, it was a welcome touch of American mindlessness that saved my Fourth of July. I would have said it was a popcorn movie, though as far as I can tell, popcorn is not popular here in Germany...at least, I haven't seen it for sale at any stores. Nevertheless, when followed up with a pizza and a beer, it almost felt like I was back home.
Except of course that the pizza place was within about two blocks of classy examples of European architecture like this one:
But more on that later.
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